Portal Transportation in 5.2 is a bad idea.

Not just in 5.2 if you recall Cataclysm.

I haven't seen everything of the new content in 5.2, however so far I've seen a lot of portals that lead me to believe that getting to the Isle of Thunder and Isle of Giants will be done via portals, and to get to the entrance of the Raid will also be done by portals.

Now I may be wrong and have seen some really early content that didnt have the real forms of transportation active yet, but this seems like a terrible idea waiting to happen.

Am I the only person who really hates linking zones together using portals? It feels so damn lazy...

I fail to see any negative impact if this would go live, but i simply think this is just for ptr convenience.
They want their content tested, so they make it easy to get to said content, otherwise they wont have data but just anectodal evidence.

Patch 2.4 on the PTR was hilarious. There were no premades and the character copy queue was like 2 weeks long. People were making level 1 blood elves and corpse running across fatigue water just to see the isle of quel'danas. The QQ fest from level 1's on the isle and from players on the forum was deafeningly hilarious.

It was almost as loud as the "omg I didn't get my pandaria beta invite, Blizzard you jerks!"

I wouldn't mind if the portals stay permanent. Taking a flight path there the first time, or flying there the first time is going to seem fun, but the 20th week in a row that you do it you're going to wish there were portals.

I believe in the beta of mists there were auctioneers in the shrines in the vale too.... but they didnt make it to live. These things are often put into a beta to direct the flow of people to the features they want to be tested. Personally I would not have a problem if portals were left but it also doesn't take long to fly. I often fly around pandaria rather than hearth because I may want to go to a home city for an AH and want to hearth back again - so I keep my hearth off CD. It doesn't take long. I personally dont see the great lore advantage of having to move slowly around but I'm pretty much used to it now. Anyway - isnt the thunder isle the large island to the north of townlong steppes? It doesnt take long to fly there really.

Not really with patched in zones like these, but I find it very dull intercontinental transit is handled with a portal. Jumping on the zep to Borean Tundra/Howling Fjord activated a nordic piece of music and when you arrived to Northrend you could admire the world while the zep still made its way to the docks.

Probably something like this. The portal from the shrine will come as the dailies progress, while if there's a portal to the raid entrance, it may be there at the beginning simply as an expedient when the island isn't fully opened. Remember the panic when people thought they couldn't get into the Firelands raid without opening the Molten Front?